HILLINGDON UNITARY DEVELOPMENT PLAN - London Borough ...

3. OPEN LAND AND COUNTRYSIDE
Introduction
3.1 The Borough has over 5000 hectares of countryside and other open land. Agriculture is still a
major land use, and many areas have the appearance of visually attractive green countryside which also
provides many opportunities for informal recreation. There are, however, increasing demands for airport
related development, housing, shopping, employment, mineral working, transport and other proposals, all
of which exert pressures on areas of countryside and open land. Areas of degraded or underused land,
particularly in the south of the Borough, need to be restored to enhance the natural beauty of the
countryside and the open land links within urban areas. The predominantly open Areas of Environmental
Opportunity fronting major roads into the Capital and around Heathrow Airport give visitors their first
impressions and the Local Planning Authority consequently attaches great importance to their retention,
upgrading and, where appropriate, rehabilitation.
Green Belt
3.2 Almost all the open countryside and much of the remaining open land in the Borough has been
designated as Green Belt, the boundaries of which are shown on the Proposals Map. Green Belt is not a
land use in itself, but a planning tool designed to protect open land from urban development. Over the
years there has been considerable government guidance on Green Belts, most recently in PPG2 (Revised)
published in January 1995. This emphasises the continued support for Green Belt principles and the
positive role of providing access to open countryside for the urban population is also identified. These
principles are reiterated in Strategic Planning Guidance for London (RPG3, para 57-59), and form the basis
for Green Belt Policies in this Plan. Additional guidance on infill at major developed sites (including
redundant hospital sites) is set out in PPG2.
3.3 PPG2 and Strategic Planning Guidance also provide advice that Green Belt boundaries shown in
approved development plans should be altered only exceptionally. In Hillingdon the Green Belt boundary
was formerly defined in the Northwood, Ickenham and Central Hillingdon Local Plans and, outside the
areas covered by these plans, by the Initial Development Plan (IDP). An exercise was undertaken to see if
there were any exceptional circumstances to justify a change in these boundaries. Changes arising as a
result of this exercise, principally in areas where the IDP was the statutory plan, are set out below.
TABLE 3.1 ADDITIONS TO GREEN BELT BOUNDARIES
Hayes/Heathrow Area
Land adjacent to Duke of Northumberland River, Harmondsworth.
Harmondsworth Church Cemetery.
Uxbridge/Harefield Area
Springwell Lake, Harefield.
Land at Hillingdon Circus.
Railway line bordering Ickenham and Harefield.
TABLE 3.2 DELETIONS FROM THE GREEN BELT
Hayes/Heathrow Area
Land at Heathrow Airport.
Land west of the Square, Longford.
Land at Baysfarm Court, Longford.
1-8 Bath Road.
Sheraton Hotel, Bath Road.
Land at Summerhouse Lane, Harmondsworth.
London Borough of Hillingdon Unitary Development Plan